


Double, double toil and trouble

by blackkat



Series: Tumblr Drabbles [3]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural, Breaking and Entering, First Meeting, Humor, M/M, Necromancers and witches and magic oh my
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 20:13:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9088912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/pseuds/blackkat
Summary: For the prompt "You just snuck into my apartment and wait is that blood"





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Red_Hot_Holly_Berries](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Red_Hot_Holly_Berries/gifts).



Orochimaru is willing to admit to anyone but Jiraiya that he is less than perfectly put together in the mornings. It’s one of the reasons he’s never consented to roommates—one of many, granted—after the first one kept recoiling and shrieking at the sight of him before his first cup of coffee.

Tsunade had claimed the boy was high-strung. Orochimaru was less than impressed.

With this in mind, Orochimaru thinks it’s entirely justifiable that his first question upon shuffling into the kitchen happens to be, “Is that _blood_?”

It’s only belatedly that he realizes the air is crackling with dark energy, black magic sparking through his kitchen. The main table has been shoved back towards the window, and the cheap linoleum is currently sporting large, carefully painted symbols in deep crimson.

The stranger pauses, stained brush freezing halfway through a rune, and studies Orochimaru with narrow red eyes.

“Of course it’s blood,” he says dismissively, even as he sets aside the copper bowl and rises to his feet. It’s clearly the beginnings of a threatening advance, but Orochimaru is too bleary to care at the moment.

Orochimaru takes one more look at the beginnings of the diagram, checks that his coffeemaker is still in one piece, and says, “If you’re aiming for the leyline nexus, it’s about seven centimeters to the left.”

“It is not.” The white-haired man sounds deeply offended. “I did the calculations myself.”

Raising a disdainful brow, Orochimaru steps delicately over the smears of blood as he heads for the cupboard. About to pull out his usual medium roast, he changes his mind and chooses a bag of dark roast instead. It feels like that kind of morning. “And I assume, judging by your margin of error, that you were using Hagoromo’s method of prediction?”

The sudden flood of light from the bulb overhead throws the man’s sharp features into sudden relief, and Orochimaru blinks. Red tattoos on his cheeks, and another on his chin, along with that aura—definitely a necromancer of some flavor. It also manages to highlight the growing offense on his face, though Orochimaru cares much less about that.

“Hagoromo is one of the most studied scholars on the subject of leylines,” he says, sharp and very clearly not about to back down from an argument.

Of course, Orochimaru isn’t about to let it go, either. “Indra has a much more in-depth formula for calculating the energy flow,” he counters. “If you’re raising something older than a century you most certainly want to use his numbers. Hagoromo gets you close enough, but Indra’s method actually finds the center of the leyline, rather than the edges. It increases the stability many times over.”

One white brow is creeping upward, and interest overwhelms the indignation on the stranger’s face. “You’re a necromancer as well?”

Orochimaru casts him a sly smile over his shoulder as he pours the ground beans into the filter and switches the pot on. “I dabble.”

The other brow rises to join the first, and there’s a smirk tugging at one corner of his mouth. “Clearly, if you were able to tell what I was attempting before the array was finished.”

“The basics were obvious,” Orochimaru allows. “Did you break my lock?”

“I picked it,” the stranger admits without either hesitation or shame. “You’re a sorcerer?”

“I prefer ‘witch’, actually.”

The smirk deepens. “Forgive me, your house didn’t appear made of gingerbread. Apparently I didn’t look hard enough.”

Orochimaru has to hide a smile of his own behind the cupboard door as he reaches for a pair of mugs. “Must I show you my broomstick to convince you?”

“If you’d like.” He steps around one of the sigils on the floor, moving closer, and Orochimaru watches him with a raised brow. Amusement flickers in red eyes, and the man reaches out, pulling a feather out of Orochimaru’s messy braid. “However, I believe it will have to wait. The blood is drying.”

“Well, we can’t have that.” Orochimaru plucks the feather from his grasp, twirls it between his fingers, and tosses it up. Violet magic flares, and a white crow flares its wings, settling on Orochimaru’s arm with a croaking caw.

“Inform Jiraiya and Tsunade that I won’t be coming in today,” he tells the creature. “Tsunade, at least, should be at the shop by now.”

The bird croaks its agreement, then launches itself off Orochimaru’s wrist and out the open window. Orochimaru takes one look after it to make sure it’s heading in the right direction—he was, after all, rather showing off with that spell and not quite as careful as he otherwise might have been—and then pours two cups of coffee and offers, “Cream or sugar?”

There’s a spark of what might be intent in the stranger’s eyes, and he’s watching Orochimaru with interest. “Black is fine. Show me where the leyline runs?”

“With pleasure,” Orochimaru agrees, and offers his hand. “Orochimaru.”

“Tobirama,” the stranger answers, taking Orochimaru’s hand. Instead of shaking it, though, he turns it over, studying the intricate tattoo that stretches from his palm to curl around his wrist and upper arm. “Impressive.”

“I might say the same,” Orochimaru returns, flicking a pointed glance at the diagram on his floor.

That gets him a smirk with a bare edge of teeth beneath it, predatory enough that a shiver runs up Orochimaru’s spine. “The end result will be even more so.”

Somehow, faulty calculations and all, Orochimaru can’t find it in himself to doubt that.


End file.
